Head Fixation and the Mental Game

[johnyandell]

Let's discuss Damien Lafont 's intriguing first article, "Head Fixation and the Mental Game"

[stotty]

Let's discuss Damien Lafont 's intriguing first article, "Head Fixation and the Mental Game"

Fascinating, as this relates directly to boobyswift's observation about the boy in my thread 'Ok...let's improve a forehand'.

This excerpt from "Head Fixation and the Mental Game" describes the boy in my thread perfectly.

Most tennis players lift their eyes and pull their heads up before the ball reaches the racket. Their anxiety to follow their shot trajectory indicates that they are not truly in the present.

[johnyandell]

I'd say I put it up for your player Stotty, but it's one for all of us I have been waiting to put up for a while.

[klacr]

Fantastic article and something many tennis players, even us on this forum can be guilty of. I actually heard this idea stated years ago at a tennis conference.

The session was on high performance and it was just briefly touched on by presenter who ironically was Nick Saviano. He was discussing this girl's forehand and in passing brought up her head staying still watching contact point "because it keeps your mind 'here' on the ball, not over there (pointing to other side of court and target area where she is hitting)"
This always stuck with me and wanted to know more about it.

Dr. Lafont answer it in the article. Thanks you

Kyle LaCroix USPTA
Boca Raton

[gzhpcu]

Isn't this also inline with the Alexander technique, which says that the body follows the head? A good reason to keep the head still on serve and groundstrokes...

[stotty]

Evidence

I'd say I put it up for your player Stotty, but it's one for all of us I have been waiting to put up for a while.

Well there is nothing like a bit of hard evidence to back up a great article:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTxgXcbO4IM&feature=youtu.be

It was a great article. I have never really thought about the implications of having the head up in that way before.

[johnyandell]

Actually Nick was one of the people who turned me on to Damien's work.

[hockeyscout]

As a hockey coach I found this article intriguing. My wife, who coaches track and field was reading it in amazement.

I'd like to think we know a few things about keeping our head up in a vicious contact sport like hockey.

I know a track and field coach has the positioning of the eyes down to a science NO hockey coach understands (I am trying).

The head positioning has ZERO to do with the mental game.

It's a bio-mechanical issue.

Saying something is mental is an easy way out (and not getting to base cause).

When someone brings up "mental" issues to me I can usually discover it is nutrition or athletic based cause in the end.

I had the same conversation with a MMA coach who recently told me it was "all mental" as well, and fine, I outlined to him what the issues were, and to his credit he was interested in development of his athlete and leaving his ego at the door.

The coach kept harping on the kids eyes being in the wrong spot. I said it will all neurology based, and went to cause for that individual athlete.

The kid and the coach thought new age CORE Training will solve these issues, however, that is laughable, as advanced work will result in an injured athlete.

Anyways, we came up with a winning plan.

So, we built from the ground up, and I threw away all these gimmicky balls, TRX, BOSU shit and balance boards which he is not handling correctly, and are completely over his head!

I literally started from the ground up. Literally. The floor! I did static balance exercises to start with, and then I progress it up from their into five separate phases when I saw things firing the way I need.

The athlete was dying, and could not believe it as it wasn't Rocky IV training I am putting him through.

His nutrition plan was good, so it came off well, and I had no inflammation which is a bonus (Yerba mate tea, what a great product, it saves an athletes ass).

The kids coaches of course see this is working (and the coach is doing this with athlete by the way and just wanting to die after 15 minutes), they want to do it more often and even ramp it up, however, no.

Anyways, it is slow and steady. I'm always very mindful of an athletes instability in the joint regions. I also have some major range of motion issues here with this one athlete and I am continually tweaking what I am doing by adding in certain strengthening exercises.

It's interesting because I have identified why he's always injured, and what's going wrong, so I think it helped the whole training process.

If the kid had a bit more money I'd send him to Germany to get an assessment from Dr. Hans-Wilhelm Muller-Wohlfahrt, so I could better understand a few more things that are happening with this athlete, and have a better plan, however, cash is an issue for most of these MMA kids unlike tennis players.

Athletes need to be taught how recruit the correct muscle groups from the ground up and use the proper muscle pattern mechanics ...

... so ...

You're playing durable sport (in tennis you call it consistency).

And, yes, we fixed the athletes head positioning through proper proprioception pathways training, instead of blaming it all on "mental issues."

[bottle]

Tea

Yerba mate tea and better proprioception pathways-- my God. I know my physical therapist has me balancing on my right foot and throwing a hard rubber ball into a slanted trampoline. Throw catch throw catch. One of these days I'll throw catch thirty times without putting left foot down.

[hockeyscout]

Yerba mate tea and better proprioception pathways-- my God. I know my physical therapist has me balancing on my right foot and throwing a hard rubber ball into a slanted trampoline. Throw catch throw catch. One of these days I'll throw catch thirty times without putting left foot down.

Yerba mate tea will save your ass! I like the lack of caffeine in it, however, it's needed for inflammation.

That's pretty heavy reps? You should ask why you are not doing 2-4 reps, and breaking down those 30 some reps into eight other separate exercises (8 x 4 = 32), and seeing if you can max out at 50 once a week?

[don_budge]

The Head...

Keep your head in the game!

[jeremy93]

I totally agree with everything in this article. I too have first learned this several years ago from Nick Saviano. Keeping the head down until after the completion of the forward swing is a massive help for confidence and as a 5.0 level player it helps me tremendously with my own strokes (or more accurately the demons in my head). It has helped virtually everyone (players I work with) I have done it with as well. It is absolutely true that in tennis keeping the head still during the contact phase helps you to stay present in addition to all the technical benefits that come along with it. Great article!

[johnyandell]

Damien was one of the first to call attention to this!